


Autumn Leaves

by crackleviolet



Category: Mystic Messenger (Video Game)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-11
Updated: 2017-04-11
Packaged: 2018-10-17 20:16:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,239
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10601427
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crackleviolet/pseuds/crackleviolet
Summary: This is my first fic for JuminV week and actually a merge of both of the day 1 themes: photography and nostalgia/childhood, largely because I listened to When we were young by Adele and sobbed for about three years.Jumin is about to leave for college and his head is in a very weird place.





	

Autumn came early that year. **  
**

Jumin took note of the steady decay of the tree outside of his bedroom window. First it started as a point of curiosity, when the first leaves began to change. He described the transformation in his journal; the green of summer making way for the warmer hues of autumn.

The first leaves fell on the day he got his college acceptance letter; the first in weeks that Father agreed to come home for dinner and, as such, one that left Jumin feeling physically ill. While his stepmother turned her wineglass and sat back in her chair so as to perfectly show off both her new dress and shoes, he spent the evening nudging his foie gras around the plate.

He didn’t remember exactly what it was that spurred him onto excusing himself from the dinner table, only that he regretted it the moment he stepped out into the cold without a jacket. It was only as he wondered if returning into the house would cause more questions that he spotted him.

Jihyun crouched in the middle of the street, his camera poised so close to the floor that his nose all but grazed the tarmac. When he caught sight of Jumin approaching, he did not wave a greeting, but for him to step back two paces and avoid stepping on the butterfly he meant to photograph.

It was strangely reassuring that some things never changed. As Jihyun stood up and checked over the pictures he had taken, Jumin was reminded of every occasion over the years that he had found him with a paintbrush in his hand, adding another coat to the fence outside of the Kim residence.

“I thought you’d be at dinner,” said Jihyun, still checking his pictures. “Did something happen?”

Straight to the point, then.

“I got a letter today,” he said. “I’ve been accepted into my first choice.”

It was a loaded statement and even Jihyun did not fully understand why, but he didn’t need to.

“You don’t seem happy about that,” he said, without a hint of doubt.

By all accounts, Jumin knew he ought to have been happy. He had gotten into his first choice, which logistically speaking was the most satisfactory outcome. He had been preparing for this moment since he put on his first tie in kindergarten and explained to his teacher that he needed to be qualified beyond a High School standard if he was to attain entry to the overseas school he wanted.

And he had achieved it, had he not? All of the nights he had spent studying for further examinations had paid off. So too had the summers that he spent indoors, only sneaking out at Jihyun’s insistence. As far as data and certifications went, everything had gone according to plan.

He should have been satisfied, but he found that he was not. He found himself thinking of the one summer that Jihyun climbed the tree outside of his bedroom window and scared him half to death by tapping on the glass while he was in the middle of an advanced mathematics equation.

Unbidden, he remembered being eight years old and sitting on the grass with a juice box after Jihyun dragged him away from his books.

“That woman,” Jihyun had said, turning over his own juice box to examine the writing. “She’s…your mother, right?”

“No.”

“Oh.”

They remained silent for a while, only broken when Jihyun flopped backwards and gazed up at the sky.

“Don’t you think that one looks like a rabbit?”

Jumin remembered his vague gestures and the certainty in his own voice as he explained that the clouds that day were cumulus structures.

“Maybe,” Jihyun had laughed, “but there’s the ears and that bit there’s the fluffy tail.”

And as he took a sip of juice, Jumin found that he could see it. He remembered bringing it up the next time he saw his father, only to be told he was wasting his childhood.

“If you have time to chase the clouds,” were his father’s exact words, “you have time to study.”

And at the time, he had apologised. At the time, he had agreed. It made sense that his overall goal was to attend the overseas college and graduate with the highest marks in his class, if not a year early.

Jumin remembered every time he had left Jihyun in the middle of counting the hour by dandelion for fear his tutor might say something if he was late again.

Truthfully, he had always believed the acceptance would be worth it and he could finally feel fulfilled after years of careful preparation. Now that he was older, he found himself looking back upon his life like the main character in a movie he stole away to watch, overwhelmed by every afternoon wasted in study.

Jihyun was standing right in front of him and already he missed him. Jumin missed everything they had ever been and everything they had not. He missed every juice box he had never accepted and every cloud he had never watched. He was suddenly sad for every word he had never said and each one that he had so carelessly.

He did not know how to explain that to Jihyun, though, so instead he did the unthinkable.

Prior to that day, he had not tried to use Jihyun’s camera equipment, stating that it would be costly to replace if damaged and of the two he had the least experience. Even so, Jihyun allowed him to take it.

“Are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” said Jumin. “Just…I want to photograph you…in this light.”

The sun was beginning to set; the clouds taking on a golden sheen and bringing a peach hue to Jihyun’s hair.

“Alright,” he said, though it was clear being the subject of a photograph was as strange to him as photography was for Jumin. As Jumin raised the camera, Jihyun thought for a moment before going for the victory pose.

As he took the picture, Jumin considered that it was perfect. That the moment was not wasted and he could take the photograph with him overseas to remember a time before it was too late.

The picture was blurry, though; Jihyun’s smile impossible to make out and his pose indeterminable. Jumin found that his heart sank even though he knew that he should have seen such a thing coming. He had never had cause to take a photo in his life and this was spur of the moment to say the least.

Jihyun did not pretend to know his reasoning, but he laughed and readjusted the camera.

“Let’s try this again,” he said, taking two steps over to Jumin and linking his arm over his shoulder.

“One, two,” said Jihyun, readying his smile and glancing across at Jumin, who took a moment before taking the only pose either of them knew: the victory sign. “VEEEEEEE!”

That picture was perfect, showing both of them smiling, bathed in the lingering autumn sunlight. Regardless of its quality, however, there would never have been another. As Jihyun checked through his pictures, a cold wind whistled through the trees and dislodged several leaves from the tree outside of Jumin’s window. The same tree that stood behind them in Jihyun’s photo, leaving Jumin all the more determined to preserve it as an immaculate portrait of the past.

Autumn was early, but they were still young.


End file.
